The History and Origins of Rock,Paper,Scissors

Please note: all info was found on Wiki, YouTube and my own knowledge.

Rock,Paper,Scissors has probably been used in just about EVERY Anime ever made either being played for fun or to get out of doing something. But where exactly did it come from? Japan has been give most of the credit for creating their version of it but where did it come from originally?! Depending on what Anime you are watching what I call rock-paper-scissors is actually called Jan-ken-Pon! in Japan.

Mushi-ken, the earliest Japanese sansukumi-ken game (1809). From left to right: Slug (namekuji), frog (kawazu), and snake (hebi).

The first known mention of the game was in the book Wuzazu (zh) (simplified Chinese: 五杂俎; traditional Chinese: 五雜組) by the Chinese Ming Dynasty writer Xie Zhaozhi (谢肇淛; fl. ca. 1600), who wrote that the game dated back to the time of the Chinese Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD). In the book, the game was called shoushiling (手势令; lit "hand command"). Li Rihua's (李日华) book Note of Liuyanzhai (六砚斋笔记) also mentions this game, calling it shoushiling (手势令), huozhitou (豁指头), or huoquan (豁拳).

Throughout Japanese history there are frequent references to "sansukumi-ken" (三竦み拳), meaning "ken" (拳) [fist] games with a three-way [三] (san) deadlock [竦み] (sukumi), in the sense that A beats B, B beats C, and C beats A.The games originated in China before being imported to Japan and subsequently becoming popular.

The earliest Japanese "sansukumi-ken" game was known as "mushi-ken" (虫拳), which was imported directly from China. In "Mushi-ken" the "frog" (represented by the thumb) is superseded by the "slug" (represented by the little finger), which, in turn is superseded by the "snake" (represented by the index finger), which is superseded by the "frog". Although this game was imported from China the Japanese version differs in the animals represented. In adopting the game, the original Chinese characters for the poisonous centipede (蜈蜙) were apparently confused with the characters for the "slug" (蛞蝓).The most popular sansukumi-ken game in Japan was kitsune-ken (狐拳). In the game, a supernatural fox called a kitsune (狐) defeats the village head, the village head (庄屋) defeats the hunter, and the hunter (猟師) defeats the fox. Kitsune-ken, unlike mushi-ken or rock-paper-scissors is played by making gestures with both hands.  The Anime Naruto took that to a whole new level though I mean THAT version of the game 

Kitsune-ke From left to right: The hunter (ryōshi), village head (shōya), and fox (kitsune).

Today, the best-known "sansukumi-ken" is called "jan-ken",which is a variation of the Chinese games introduced in the 17th century."Jan-ken" uses the rock, paper, and scissors signs and is the game that the modern version of rock-paper-scissors derives from directly. Hand-games using gestures to represent the three conflicting elements of rock, paper, and scissors have been most common since the modern version of the game was created in the late 19th century, between the Edo and Meiji periods.

By the early 20th century, rock-paper-scissors had spread beyond Asia, especially through increased Japanese contact with the west. Its English-language name is therefore taken from a translation of the names of the three Japanese hand-gestures for rock, paper and scissors: elsewhere in Asia the open-palm gesture represents "cloth" rather than "paper". The shape of the scissors is also adopted from the Japanese style.

Beyond Asia...

The game seems to have arrived in Europe in the early 20th century and to have become popular by the late 1920s. In Britain in 1924 it was described in a letter to a newspaper as a hand game, possibly of Mediterranean origin, called "zhot". A reader then wrote in to say that the game "zhot" referred to was evidently Jan-ken-pon, which she had often seen played throughout Japan. Although at this date the game appears to have been new enough to British readers to need explaining, the appearance by 1927 of a popular thriller with the title Scissors Cut Paper, followed by Stone Blunts Scissors(1929), suggests it quickly became popular.

In 1927, a children's magazine in France described it in detail, referring to it as a "jeu Japonais" ("Japanese game"). Its French name, "Chi-fou-mi", is based on the Old Japanese words for "one, two, three" ("hi, fu, mi").

A New York Times article of 1932 on the Tokyo rush hour describes the rules of the game for the benefit of American readers, suggesting it was not at that time widely known in the U.S.A.

In the videogame clip that I was able to find from a game called Alex Kidd In The Enchanted Castle a mini-game can be played called rock-paper-scissors at some point or at least that's what the non-Japanese versions were lead to believe! In the Japanese version they are all playing a game called Yakyuken written as 野球拳 and spoken as "Yak-yu-ken!" which DOES translate to rock-paper-scissors however this is only a variant of the original game. In Yakyuken it is more of a "strip-poker" variant of rock-paper-scissors in which the loser either loses an article of their clothing or in this case... becomes totally naked.

From Hunter X Hunter

Sailor Moon Collectible Collections Card Game

Sailor Moon Card Game

From Bleach

From The World Is Still Beautiful... though I'm pretty sure after this round some people had there doubts about it

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